The Garden
by KeepSmiling1
Summary: Written for IWSC Writing School Challenge - Luna Lovegood is a unique character. It makes sense that her refuge at Hogwarts would stand out as well.


Writing School Challenge: Dialogue and Action Tags

Story Title: The Garden

School: Durmstrang

Prompt: _[Setting] A serene Garden with a beautiful fountain_

Year: 4

Word count: 973

**The Garden**

Names held meaning. For the life of her, Luna Lovegood would never be able to understand why Headmaster Dumbledore would call this beautiful forest "Forbidden". Now the Ravenclaw Common Room, that deserved to have such an appellation. Luna's feet sped up, a sudden gust of chilly air forcing her to grab tight onto her cape.

A Rumdigger caught onto her hair, its long antennae-like eyes bending forward to look at her face.

"Hello Rum. How has the garden been doing?" Luna paused significantly as though waiting for a response before continuing in the same vein. "That's nice? Is your family well? Diggy laid her eggs? That's wonderful!"

Had there been any witnesses to this "conversation", Luna Lovegood would have been summarily stunned and levitated to the hospital wing. Thankfully, Luna was completely alone...by some definitions of alone. From the perspective of Luna, the forest—and in particular, the garden that was her ultimate goal—was where she was least alone. In the eyes of Luna, the forest teemed with life just waiting to befriend those who wish to _see_.

Presently, the blond found herself at her destination—a seemingly desolate clearing that had obviously been formed by human hands. The trees that surrounded the spot bore the scorch marks of a powerful battle that cared little about any resulting damage. These trees stood as a silent memorial of the destruction borne by their brothers and sisters while a small stream fed into the clearing's centerpiece—an ancient magical fountain that Luna believed may have been created by Helga Hufflepuff.

Luna had visited this spot three or four evenings a week for months. While not traditionally pretty (_yet_ a voice inside her specified), this garden, her garden, was more beautiful to her than any she had seen before in her travels with her father. Its inhabitants called to her (both figuratively and literally) and the place granted her a peace that was foreign in the cold stone walls of Hogwarts. She transplanted seedlings from other parts of the forest and tended to them as if it were her life's mission, all while listening to the songs of the fountain and talking to the creatures who called her friend.

"_Water Sprite, _

_Water Sprite, _

_What changes you have wrought! _

_More changes still are coming, _

_Encase not your heart in steel." _the babbling fountain warned.

Luna laughed as a spray of water went awry seemingly on its own and splashed her. "Don't worry, dear fountain, your water sprite won't lose her ability to bend." In the early days, the name water sprite had confused Luna, but she now understood it to be a reference to the way she made her own path in life.

As she gently made her way to the fountain with the aim of redirecting the water to the more distant seedlings, Luna felt a light tug on her robe. A baby wrackspurt appeared to be clinging to the edge of her clothing. "Dear me, are you cold little one? It is a bit chilly out here. What say you come up here?" Luna suited her words to action and felt around for the little guy who, unlike an adult wrackspurt, was only cleverly camouflaged rather than completely invisible. Its age made the dangers associated with wrackspurts minimal. Even if the baby scrambled her thoughts a little, Luna knew that she would stay mostly in control of herself and be able to remove the little one before anything too disastrous happened.

"_Prrrr, Prrr," _went the babe as it wrapped around her neck like a particularly heavy scarf. Prrr Prrr was Luna's name in _Wrackspurt_, you see. While both Luna and wrackspurts were quite intelligent, it was an unfortunate consequence of being unable to see the one that Luna was unable to determine much more about their culture and language than her name.

Over the course of the evening, all manner of creatures crept out of their hidey-holes to greet the friendly child in their midst. She took care of some. Others took care of her. When her stomach growled in protest of a skipped supper, a Thorn-eating Twiddlydash brought her a supply of berries that it had found while foraging. "Eat these," his eyes seemed to say.

A young rabbit came a-visiting at the same time, providing her company as well as someone to help.

When her eyes began to be strained by the encroaching darkness and late hour, a troop of fairies danced lightly around her. "G-O T-O S-L-E-E-P!" they spelled with their twinkling lights.

The forest floor would not normally be a terribly comfortable bed, but then, few normal people have a forest that is full of friends seeking your comfort. At the far edge of her garden, well away from the fountain, stood a rather large nest created by downy donations from the forest's avian citizens. More often than not, Luna would fall asleep in this nest. One friend or another would always wake her in time to get back to the school.

-scene break-

Lysander and his brother loved exploring the forest. One area was of particular interest to the twins. It always felt...like home to the two boys, welcoming. Their sharp eyes, trained by parents who loved nature, could see spell damage to the eldest trees. These marked the edge of an area in which young plants grew, happily fed by a nearby fountain. It almost seemed to be an animal sanctuary. Creatures that they rarely saw away from home would visit them in this place. The boys' ears were not yet trained in the fine art of communication with nature. Had they been so, they would know that the creatures welcomed them because their souls bore a remarkable resemblance to another student.

"_Water sprites, water sprites," _sings the fountain.

"Prrr Prrr, Prrr Prrr," goes the wrackspurt.

"Friend, Friend," calls Nature.


End file.
